School "Culture Day' - why didn't school see this coming?

[mids2019]

https://www.joe.co.uk/news/school-issues-statement-after-sending-girl-home-for-wearing-union-jack-dress-496690?fbclid=IwY2xjawLkEB9leHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHmXD4szLMfsqNubbE12kCn_Noe5jb2VGlNFVU0_IUIevHxzByCQ-5GXFN8F8_aem_P-q7I_yFCq82TY-Qr8mGdw

A local school state d a huge debate by sending a girl home on school culture day for wearing a union Jack dress. The question is why the school should have naively held an event which actually least a to more division than unity?

My daughter (white British) attended a similar event, for which she paid a pound, and dressed in jeans and t shirt. I asked how she had decided upon the attire and she stated 'well I don't have a culture'. I then had to explain that she did have a culture and even the jeans and t shirt were a product of fashion changes in western liberal society. We had a discussion about all the great products of white British culture, the music,science, results of the industrial revolution, shared experience in great wars, monarchy etc.

There is a white British culture but going into detail about this obviously brings into focus cultural divide and opens up divisive areas whether white British culture benefited from colonialism and past oppression.

Of course culture day probably was meant to highlight minority cultures and act to promote dress etc. from ethnic minorities as a welcoming inclusive gesture but by allowing all pupils to think about their culture we have to define 'white British' culture and by defining 'white British' culture schools have inadvertently started a discussion they didn't intend.

How do you tell? What markers identify a piece as AI?

People asking about the Tommy Robinson connection - well actually I think this whole thing suggests that Tommy Robinson has a point! It's playing right into his hands!

The whole "you can't say you're British anymore, you can't fly the flag" - well the school have just reinforced this line of thinking.

I say this as someone who is fairly leftie and despises Tommy Robinson.

All of this.

The school's thinking was clearly from a very narrow political viewpoint ,which excluded cultures and heritage that exist within their school.

By making her a bigger one?

Two brain cells between them

*achievements

You expressed this so well. Every one of these tone deaf policies in schools, colleges and universities sends more voters to the right. I have worked in all settings and I wish there would always be a balanced view presented but this is not the case in my experience.

Or Glasgow, sadly, where I am.

If the school knew there was form for this, it would have been particularly stupid not to foresee the outcome here

This isn't quite the accurate picture of the sectarian issue in Scotland.

The Union flag, and the Irish Tricolour are both synonymous with Sectarian activities in Scotland, and in the case of the Union flag specifically, contextually it's not really seen as an expression of a "British" theme as much as it is an anti-catholic statement, hence why it's sensitive and usually prohibited by schools etc.

It's not about "Scottish - OK, British - Not", because that's not really how it's perceived when the subtext is football/identity-related sectarianism.

This will be a completely different story in 40 years time when white people will be a minority in the uk.
Its really sad that celebrating anything to do with being white is seen as racist.

Aren't these the colours of the flag of another country? Hmm let me think.

Or maybe you'd be sent home for being a MAGA supporter. Or for being a communist from North Korea.

Agreed. The reason why, despite supporting one of the 'big two' we've openly discouraged our 3DS from supporting either. We enrolled them in rugby & it's been a huge & welcome influence on them all. They love football & support Barcelona & Liverpool - suggested by their dad & they've stuck to that all their lives (now young adults).

Yes I’m trying to understand it but it still seems wrong to me.

Not the banning of colours, I can see how divisive sectarianism can be. But the banning of one group’s colours only. I could get with no foreign colours (that’s in some way neutral). But foreign colours great, except those ones.

As I say, I’m not deeply versed in this but I am interested. Scottish symbolism can’t really be seen as the unifying neutral, as it’s so closely tried with another contentious issue, independence.

Perfectly explained.

@Violinist64 snap! I’m awed by the tough and amazing lives my ancestors led. My mum’s side were miners and dockworkers. Dad’s side were moderately prosperous farmers, trades like cobbling and more recently engineering. One of my granddads installed power cables all across Britain, and one was killed in the blackout on railway lines during WWII helping to keep supply trains running for our troops. And the women worked and were proud - god how they worked. My gran was a milliner and later a greengrocer when her husband was killed. She raised two kids through hard times. She was a staunch Labour supporter of the old kind: working-class pride, make-do-and-mend and self-sufficiency - she would never take a “handout”.

id love for these stories to be told in schools - the stories of grit and resilience, the stories of innovation and political awakening. These are the places where we can understand the diversity of our culture, and not just the history of the ruling class which is what we are going back to teaching in reverse!

My school has an annual culture day - it is a huge school with students of different nationalities / backgrounds and is a great day with lots of activities. The highlight is a parade of students in their national costumes (they can choose to participate in this or not). The smallest contingency is always England (despite this nationality not being in the minority in this school - students always say that they don’t have an obvious national costume ) and last year they were booed.

See downwiththissortofthing's post.

And the Scottish flag is quite unifying. It's definitely not universally seen as representing independence. I'm not an SNP supporters in any shape or form & love the Scottish flag. It's flown everywhere here, it doesn't just mean you're pro-independence.

That's awful. The school should really address that.

Yes, I thought that part was written by the parents.

The school didn’t go to the press. The school isn't doing Daily Mail sad faces.

@MumofSpud booed? oh my god that’s horrible. I honestly think that with the best of intentions trying to “correct” how we teach history we are making our kids think that being pro-British or worse pro-English is equivalent to Nazism or facism. There’s no space in the curriculum for nuance or debate - you simply have to agree that the British empire was bad and so now being pro-British means you must be bad too.

It is bonkers!

I think this is a sensible idea. Its unfortunate that the Union Jack has been hijacked by the far right and made us ashamed of it. I think the school had a knee jerk reaction. But how they explain their reaction to the children I do not know.

You have contradcted yourself in yourself in your last paragraph. It obviously wasn't such a great day if the English children, the vast majority of children in the school ny your own admission, were booed for being English. This is actually racism. Oh, sorry, white English people are not allowed to be victims of racism, are they?

I think you need to look up the history of sectarianism in Ireland, and why it is linked to Scotland.

For those saying ‘just a tree’ ‘just a tree’ 🙄

The conviction was for the highest level of criminal damage, aggravated by its impact on a UNESCO World Heritage Site and damage to Hadrian’s wall. This was an extremely serious act of mindless vandalism and criminal damage.